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| > Sermon Archive > Sermons by Author > Rev. Stephen 't Hart > The believer's assurance through the eating and drinking of Christ | Previous Next Print |
| Order Of Worship (Liturgy) 2014 Book of Praise ESV Bible translation Greeting Psalm 34:1,3 Apostles' Creed: Hymn 1 Prayer Read: John 6:35-59 Psalm 63:1,2,3 Text: Lord's Day 28,29 Hymn 60:1,2,3 Prayer Collection Hymn 61:1,2 Blessing |
(Note: This sermon can also be used for a sermon on both LD 28 & 29 as the theme it explores [our union with Christ] is found in both Lord's Days.)
Dear brothers and sisters in our Lord Jesus Christ.
Why did Jesus do it? Why did the Lord Jesus, on the night when he was betrayed, take a piece of bread, saying, "Take, eat; this is my body" and "Drink of it, all of you, for this is my blood of the covenant"? (Matthew 26:26,28). When the Lord Jesus gave us the sacrament of his Supper, he gave it that, as we eat from the bread and drink from the cup, we might have communion with him and with one another. What's divided us over the ages, however, is what it is that we are actually doing when we eat and drink. Roman Catholics teach that the bread and wine change in substance, so that it really has become the real body and blood of Jesus. The Lutherans don't go that far but they still teach that the physical body of Jesus is somehow in, with and under the bread and the wine of holy communion. The Reformed, and so also the Heidelberg Catechism, teaches that although it is simply bread and wine, Christ is spiritually present and so gives of himself in the Lord's Supper. And many evangelicals, following Zwingli teach that the word "is" doesn't mean that at all, that the Lord's Supper is simply a way to remember what Jesus did and how we are saved by him - and nothing more than that. Considering the confusion it has caused, therefore, why did Jesus say it? Why didn't he use different words? Why didn't he say, "This is like my body" or it "represents my body"? Why didn't he use different words? Why didn't he make himself clearer or at least explain more clearly what he meant? But of course, Jesus knew. And the Holy Spirit who is the divine author of the holy Scriptures knew. God knew that, in later days, the church would be debating the meaning of what Jesus meant when he said, "This is my body." And so there must be something important about these words. There must be a reason why the Lord Jesus said what he said, and that must be important in both our understanding of the Lord's Supper and in receiving what God intended for us in the giving of the Lord's Supper. And what makes these words so important in the context of the Lord's Supper is the assurance that God gives us in that little word "is". Turning to God's Word, especially as we read it from John 6, and hearing this in connection with the meaning of the Lord's Supper I proclaim God's Word to you under this theme:
The believer's assurance through the eating and drinking of Christ
1. Assured of our union with him
2. Assured of our participation in him
1. Assured of our union with him
One of the fascinating things about language and communication is how the things that are said by the speaker might be interpreted by the hearer. It happens so quickly that what you meant to say is not what people heard you say. And so we often have to clarify, make our meaning clearer, to those we are speaking to. And sometimes we need to backtrack. We need to say, "I did not mean that; what I really meant to say was this." But the Lord Jesus doesn't always do this. Indeed, he did not do this in John chapter 6. In John 6:35 the Lord said,
"I am the bread of life"
which led the Jews to grumble in verse 41-42 and ask,
"Is not this Jesus, the son of Joseph, whose father and mother we know? How does he now say, 'I have come down from heaven'?"
Jesus answered their grumbling, but he did not back down. Instead he repeated in verse 48,
"I am the bread of life."
And verse 51,
"I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
Which led the Jews to complain even more in verse 52 saying,
"How can this man give us his flesh to eat?”
And once again, Jesus did not back down from the direct-ness of his language. Verse 53,
"So Jesus said to them, 'Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you."
These are strong words of our Lord Jesus and we can understand why they were so offensive to the Jews that, John 6:66 says,
"many of his disciples turned back and no longer walked with him."
For the Jews it wasn't just that Jesus spoke about eating human flesh and drinking human blood, which is offensive enough in itself, but drinking any blood was expressly forbidden in God's law. In fact, the LORD even said in Leviticus 17:10 that if anyone ate blood, that God would "set his fact against that person" and "cut him off from among his people." And yet Jesus said it. He spoke about eating his flesh and drinking his blood. But why would Jesus do this? Why did he cause offence in this way? What did Jesus mean here, anyway?
Before I explain what I believe this passage to mean, I first need to explain that John 6 is not a direct reference to the Lord's Supper. Jesus isn't saying, "Unless you eat the bread and drink the cup at the Lord's Supper you have no life in you." There is, I believe, a connection to the Lord's Supper but it is not that. Here are three reasons why John 6 is not a direct reference to the Lord's Supper.
- First, when Jesus first spoke these words, the Lord's Supper had not yet been instituted. It would not be until the next Passover, a year later, that the Lord Jesus would celebrate the Supper with his disciples for the first time.
- Second, the Lord's Supper was given exclusively for the Church, for believers, whereas Jesus addressed the words of John 6 to those who did not believe in him, to the Jews who had grumbled.
- And third, when John 6:54 says, "Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life" he could not mean this to mean the bread and wine of the Lord's Supper since John 6 does teaches us that we saved not by taking the Lord's Supper but by believing in the Lord Jesus. John 6:40, for example,
- "For this is the will of my Father, that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day."
Added to this is the fact that we know that many people - Judas Iscariot included - have taken the Lord's Supper but will not be saved, whereas others such as the thief on the cross will be saved even though they had no opportunity to take the bread and wine of the Lord's Supper.
But what did the Lord Jesus mean when then he said "Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life", and why did he say it like this?
Well, what's the context? What else did the Lord Jesus say about the way to receive eternal life in John chapter 6? We've just heard that John 6:40 says that whoever believes in Christ has eternal life, and it says the same thing in verse 35 and also in verse 47. John 6:35 also says, "whoever comes to me shall not hunger." And verse 40, "everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him should have eternal life." And verse 45, "Everyone who has heard and learned from the Father comes to me." So the Lord Jesus used these words - believe, come, look, hear and learn - to explain what we are to do with respect to himself and how to receive eternal life. But then Jesus goes on to teach that having eternal life in him is to be united with, to have union with him. And he describes the way to have life in him and to be united with him is to eat him and to drink him. John 6:56-57,
"Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him. 57 As the living Father sent me, and I live because of the Father, so whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me."
And take note of those words: whoever eats and drinks "abides in me, and I in him." And "he also will live because of me." In John 6, Jesus clearly never meant that we need to eat his physical flesh or drink his physical blood in order to be joined to him. But the Lord Jesus used these words, and even doubled down on using these words in the face of objections from the Jews, to emphasis to us just how real our participation in him is. "You are what you eat", it is said, and that is certainly true when it comes to your union with Christ. When we believe in him and are joined to him, it's not just that Christ is with us, but he is in us, and we in him. And that's why, to repeat verse 57,
"whoever feeds on me, he also will live because of me."
And that's phenomenal! That's amazing! We will live forever because of him. Because he is in us, and we are in him. And that's a promise that the Bible repeats again and again. Turn with me to just one example where the Bible describes our union with Christ, to Ephesians 3:14-19.
"For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15 from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16 that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17 so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18 may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19 and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.
That Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith, and that you may be filled with all the fullness of God! And this is repeated in Colossians 2:9 where it says that "you have been filled in him." And that's why the apostle Paul goes on to exclaim in Ephesians 3:20-21,
"Now to him who is able to do far more abundantly than all that we ask or think, according to the power at work within us, 21 to him be glory in the church and in Christ Jesus throughout all generations, forever and ever. Amen."
Do you see how amazing, how wonderful and how comforting that is? Are you one of those who struggle with doubt? Do you live with the feeling that maybe God won't accept you, that you're just not good enough for God? Do you live under the constant burden of guilt, fearful that what you have done whether they be the sins of your youth or that which was more recent, excludes you from the promise of God's forgiveness? If that is so, then look again at how great the gospel really is! The good news of the gospel is that everyone who looks on the Son and believes in him will also abide in him. He in you, and you in him. And that's not just a promise for others: that is God's promise to you! Two of the most beautiful words in John chapter 6 are the words "anyone" and "whoever." John 6:51,
"If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever."
And John 6:56,
"Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood abides in me, and I in him."
And now I want you to see why the Lord Jesus did not change his words but doubled down on declaring that he is the bread of life and that whoever feeds on his flesh and drinks his blood has eternal life. Because that's how real our participation in Christ really is. No, it isn't physical, but spiritually we are united to Christ so closely and so intimately that he is in us and we are in him. We are, as Lord's Day 28 of the Catechism says,
"flesh of his flesh, and bone of his bones."
It's because our union with Christ is so real that the Lord Jesus speaks about it in terms of eating his flesh and drinking his blood.
And that, then, is also why the Lord Jesus also used the words that he did when, at the institution of the Lord's Supper, he said,
"Take, eat; this is my body"
and,
"This is my blood."
Because, as in John chapter 6, Jesus is calling us to take of himself, to embrace him, to receive him and to be filled in him. And, as answer 79 of the Catechism teaches us, Christ
"wants to teach us by his supper that as bread and wine sustain us in this temporal life, so his crucified body and shed blood are true food and drink for our souls to eternal life."
When we take the bread and we drink from the cup, something real is happening. When, having faith in Christ, you take the bread and drink from the cup, spiritually we are feeding on our Saviour Jesus and we are being assured of his union with us. And that union is so real that Jesus says to you,
"Take, eat; this is my body. This is my blood."
And that's what the Catechism means when, at the end of answer 78, it says that the bread of the Lord's Supper
"is called Christ's body in keeping with the nature and usage of the sacraments"
where the element or the thing in the sacrament is equated with what that thing is a symbol of. So in Genesis 17:10 circumcision is called the covenant of God; in 1 Cor. 5:7 Christ is called our Passover lamb; in Titus 3:5 baptism is called the washing of regeneration, and in Acts 22:16 it is called "the washing away of sins." The Bible uses this kind of language to describe the sacraments because God does not want you to miss the significance of what he is assuring you of in them. And with respect to the Lord's Supper, he wants to assure us by this visible sign and pledge
"that through the working of the Holy Spirit we share in his true body and blood as surely as we receive with our mouth these holy signs in remembrance of him."
In that way we are assured of our union with him. And even more, we are assured of our participation with him. That brings us to our second point.
2. Assured of our participation in him
The Catechism goes on in answer 79 to say,
"and, second, that all his suffering and obedience are as certainly ours as if we personally had suffered and paid for our sins."
The assurance Christ gives us at his supper is that because we abide in him, because we have union with him, we share in benefits of what he has done. And that is also the assurance of Christ's words in John 6, when he said in verse 51,
"I am the living bread that came down from heaven. If anyone eats of this bread, he will live forever. And the bread that I will give for the life of the world is my flesh.”
Jesus is referring here to in talking about giving his life for the world is his death on the cross where he would be the sacrifice for the sins of the world. In John 6:4 we are told,
"Now the Passover, the feast of the Jews, was at hand."
The Passover meal revolved around the killing and then the eating of the Passover lamb. Earlier, in John 1:29, John the Baptist had declared,
“Behold, the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!"
And this is how the Jews in John 6 were to understand what it means to eat his flesh. Richard Phillips noted in his commentary on John 6,
"By eating the Passover lamb, the Israelites identified with the sacrifice for sin offered by the lamb of God. Jesus wanted his hearers to make the connection between the Passover lamb and his own sacrificial death."
That's the context we are to understand Jesus' words in John 6:53-54,
“Truly, truly, I say to you, unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink his blood, you have no life in you. 54 Whoever feeds on my flesh and drinks my blood has eternal life, and I will raise him up on the last day."
Quoting once more from Richard Phillips,
"Just as the Israelites received the Passover in faith by spreading the blood on their doors and eating the lamb, Jesus offers salvation to the world through our believing receipt of his death in our place. Eating, therefore, describes our acceptance of Christ in faith."
But there's even more! Because when we feed on Christ by faith, we are fully united with him and therefore share both in what he has done and in what he has received. Being in union with Christ means that we participate and share in the work of Christ and therefore in the victory of Christ. Galatians 2:20 says,
"I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me."
And Romans 6:5,
"For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his."
We did not hang on the cross along with Christ to suffer all the physical agony and torment that he endured in body and soul. Christ bore the penalty for our sins on his own and in our place. But our union with Christ is the guarantee that everything our Lord did on the cross for us is counted by God as if it was done by us. And that's what the catechism means when it says
"that all his suffering and obedience are as certainly ours as if we personally had suffered and paid for our sins."
And it is in this way that we feast on Christ at the Lord's Supper. Our feasting is a participation in the body and blood of Christ. And that feasting is so vivid and so real that, when he instituted the Supper, our Lord gave bread and wine to his disciples saying, "this is my body", and "this is my blood." He did this and he said this underline the sure reality that when we by faith take this bread and wine, we are, by his Spirit, taking Christ himself. It is in this way that we are assured of our union with him and it is in this way that we are assured of our participation with him. Amen.
* As a matter of courtesy please advise Rev. Stephen 't Hart, if you plan to use this sermon in a worship service. Thank-you.
(c) Copyright 2024, Rev. Stephen 't Hart
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